RFC 2012 Panel: The 2012-13 Festival Season

RFC 2012 Panel: The 2012-13 Festival Season.
Discussion with Christof Huber (OpenAir St.Gallen, Chairman Yourope, CH), Ben Challis (General Counsel Glastonbury Festival, UK), Ivan Milivojev (Exit Festival, RS) and Stefan Lehmkuhl (Melt! Booking and Berlin Festival, DE). Host was Greg Parmley (Intellitix and ILMC).
With the 2012 open air season largely over, it was time to recap—and time to preview the upcoming season. One of the central issues to be discussed was the European festival association Yourope’s initiative to introduce a standard-form contract for festival performances. Will the model agreement catch on as a universally accepted standard contract?
The push for this initiative arose from, among other things, differences in case law and liability issues within Europe, as well as the increasing complexity of contracts coming from agencies and artists’ reps. Moreover, at just five pages in length, the Yourope contract is far more concise than many of the usual agreements.